


Yet Shall We Live

by aeriamamaduck



Series: Yet Shall We Live [1]
Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Angst, Canonical Character Death, Child Loss, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, Marriage Proposal, Memory Alteration, Oral Sex, Original Character Death(s), Past Character Death, Post-Canon, Post-Canon Fix-It, Resurrection, Survivor Guilt, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-03
Updated: 2017-03-05
Packaged: 2018-08-19 07:25:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8195855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeriamamaduck/pseuds/aeriamamaduck
Summary: Martin finds himself in the right place at the wrong time, suddenly resurrected two centuries after his sacrifice with no memory of his time in the afterlife. Thrust into an unfamiliar time among his descendants he wonders how life can continue when Minerva has been dead for years.Then comes a scream from a supposedly silent crypt.





	1. and I'll find you another time

_Smoke everywhere. The air smells like blood, smoke, and death. Wait…Not anymore._

_Stop._

_I was holding his hand. My son’s hand. I had a son? I did, I remember._

Martin kept his eyes shut, trying to determine why he was shivering with cold when the air had been heavy with heat just moments before. He strained his ears for the sounds of terrified shouting and monstrous roaring from outside, but there was only silence. Calm.

_He’s there but not here. He’s dead and I…_

_Am I supposed to be dead too?_

A voice, strange, male, choked with fear. He was in front of Martin, but out of reach. “…Nivea, what in Oblivion’s name just happened?”

Then a woman, the tremor of her melodious voice driving a surge of familiarity through Martin. As if he knew her, as if she was somehow of vital importance to him. “I…This wasn’t supposed to…Oh gods…”

Unable to deny that something was completely wrong Martin slowly opened his eyes, his heart jumping painfully when he didn’t see the dreaded red haze that came in the wake of a Gate. The light surrounding him was merely torchlight…

Three people stood some feet away from him, flanked by what appeared to be four Blades. All of them bore looks of utter disbelief, but Martin’s gaze was drawn to the two women nearest him.

One was an old woman, loose silver hair framing age-softened features, which included vivid green eyes. She wore a deep blue cloak, but it failed to conceal the bright red gem that, to Martin’s horror and fascination, seemed to be embedded into the flesh of her chest. _…The Amulet of Kings?_

The second woman was younger, dark where the other was fair but with matching green eyes. He could feel the power emanating from her, pulsing like a heartbeat even from out of her unflinching gaze. For a moment he wondered if she was even completely human.

It was she who exclaimed to the older woman while raising a hand to point right at him, “Mother…that’s Martin Bloody Septim standing there!”

He breathed shakily as he stared back at them. They knew who he was. Frightened he looked around, searching for the only other soul who’d been with him in the Temple, whose forgiveness he’d been praying for only moments before. “…Minerva?” The others started at the sound of his voice, but he only kept looking around for Minerva’s familiar figure, clad in the bloodied white and black of Kvatch. “Minerva, where are you?!”

No, he couldn’t find her. He’d left her standing at the wall furthest from the doors, looking at him in confusion just after he’d said his farewells to her. Then Dagon had destroyed the dome and Martin had shattered the Amulet.

 _Could she have been killed? No, she was safe, she was alive! Wasn’t she?_ He grew more panicked as the seconds passed and there was no sign of Minerva anywhere.

One of the Blades asked fearfully, “Why’s he calling out to…?”

Martin spun around to look at the unfamiliar people, desperate for answers. Why were they not helping him? Why were they just standing there?

The old man who’d stood beside the two women suddenly stepped forward. He was a Redguard, tall and bearded, his white hair done up in a neat bun near the top of his head. He approached Martin slowly, holding his hands up before him. “Your Majesty…Martin…It’s alright, everything is alright.”

No, nothing was alright. He shook his head and demanded, “Who are you? Where’s the Hero of Kvatch? What have you done to her?!”

“Where do you think you are right now, Martin?” the man asked, avoiding the question.

Martin gave his surroundings a desperate look. “…This…this is the Temple of the One, but…” He shook his head as he shivered with cold and saw the starry sky above him. “I don’t understand…Mehrunes Dagon was out there…The sky…The stars, they’re…” Save for the Temple, everything was intact. There were no screams, no sound of people dying. “…Is it over? Have the Gates been closed somehow?” he asked, feeling hope for the first time since opening his eyes.

Yet another Blade hissed to her Bladebrother, “Great Talos, is it really him?!”

The old man shushed her and continued calmly, “Please don’t be alarmed, Martin…We are safe now. Oblivion no longer threatens us, but…You’re not when you think you are.”

Martin’s heart fell as he struggled to comprehend. “…When…?” What other time could he possibly be in?

This time it was the silver-haired woman who spoke, approaching just as slowly as the man did. “It’s been two-hundred and eleven years since the day Mehrunes Dagon appeared in the Imperial City. I’m sure you know what you did to defeat him…”

The amount of years hit him like a hammer striking an anvil. He felt colder, if it was at all possible, staring at the woman whose eyes radiated with sympathy. “Two-hundred…? This can’t…No! Then how am I…?”

“What do you remember?” asked the young woman, authority in her voice as she quickly made her way to him, taking no care like the other two had. Her eyes were as blunt as her voice. “After you shattered the Amulet…Do you remember anything?”

He looked at her, for a second wondering why her eyes were so familiar, and tried to remember. It should have been so simple to just recall it all, as if he were remembering watching Minerva emerge from the gate into Paradise, but it was as if huge iron doors slammed shut, blocking his way entirely. He shook his head as he came to the same conclusion, whatever he tried to recall. “I…I’m sorry, I-I…It’s all _blocked_ , I can’t…” He suddenly realized how many years they told him had passed. An impossible amount of years. Sorrow formed a lump in his throat as he concluded that try as he might, he would never find who he was searching for again. “Then, Minerva, she…”

He found himself falling to his knees, the very thought making him dizzy with disbelief. He’d never wanted to think this, never wanted to be the one left behind, alone. But it was completely and undeniably true, and there was no way for him to deny it. “She’s dead…”

The old woman…no, her name was Nivea, he recalled. She slowly knelt in front of him, brows drawn together in a look of sorrow. “She is,” she said so gently.

Martin let out a trembling breath as the tears escaped. Of course she was. How could someone like him ever deserve to have _the world_ , her beauty and strength, her effortless kindness? Was this his punishment for his sins? To be doomed to live out the rest of his wretched life while she was dead and buried? “Did she survive the battle at least?” he asked, not wanting to imagine her dying in the Temple after all.

“This is…I can’t think of another way to say this, but…” Nivea cleared her throat and stated slowly, “She did survive, and…she had a son. Your son.”

Martin sucked in a breath at that, suddenly taking the woman by the shoulders and finding the confirmation in her eyes. His heart raced ceaselessly as the world fell apart, put itself back together, and fell apart again. No, no, he remembered, he hadn’t _known_ she was with child!

Every battle preceding the siege in the Imperial City flashed through his mind, and he recalled Minerva dodging blows as she ran into the Great Gate, remembered her bruised and bloody form when she appeared in Cloud Ruler Temple after Paradise collapsed. He remembered one instance of wrapping his arms around her from behind, hand unconsciously caressing down her front. He hadn’t known.

“She was _pregnant?!”_ He was struck by another, terrifying possibility. “By the Nine, she…Did she know!?”

The young woman shook her head. “No, she didn’t find out herself until about a week after you died.” Then she turned to look toward the wooden doors leading to the outside, and Martin suddenly heard exclamations of shock and fear coming from outside. The woman made a growling noise and said, “Sounds like people are starting to notice that there’s no dragon statue in the middle of the fucking district.”

A Blade immediately asked, “Shall we bar the doors, my Empress?”

Nivea answered with a quick nod. “Yes, do so.” She raised herself to her feet with a grunt of effort, the Redguard steadying her. “We should move to the Temple interior, Martin. We can explain more there.”

Martin got to his feet but reached for Nivea’s thin wrist. “Wait! Who are you all? Why did that Blade call you ‘Empress’?”

The young woman replied in the same, straightforward way with a flick of her thumb in Nivea’s direction, “Because she’s Dragonborn, like you and me. We’re your descendants. Yours and Minerva’s. I guess the eye color didn’t give it away.”

Martin was stunned into silence, gazing at the two women somehow descended from Minerva…from him. Their eyes, the same vivid green that blazed like fire, and it was as if Minerva were looking at him from wherever she was.

He let the women with Minerva’s eyes lead him into the interior.

-

Martin sat at a table and stared at his mug of cold tea, going over everything he’d learned in his mind. Nivea was the Empress of Tamriel, and a bloody war had been fought to put her on the throne in the years following the assassination of the Mede Emperor. Her husband was the old man, Faizal, and the fierce-eyed young woman was their daughter, Crown Princess Aziza. She was not only Dragonborn, she was the fabled Dragonslayer, called Dovahkiin in the ancient language.

From the time of his son Martin Gaius's birth they’d hidden their identity, Minerva having wanted to protect their son from any remaining enemies of the Septims. His throat tightened at the thought of her so frightened and alone. He had done that to her.

Worse still he’d led her to the awful death they’d just recounted to him. Poisoned by a surviving agent of the Mythic Dawn, masquerading as a friend, Minerva dying in their son’s arms, in front of their little granddaughter.

He didn’t want to keep coming back to those thoughts but he could only picture Minerva in pain, her agonized screams, his son’s helplessness, and a little girl’s terror. He thought of where he was; the living area of the Temple. A priestess stood silently, though the awe on her face was unmistakable. It was the first week of Sun’s Dawn, Fourth Era. 211.

_Her face when she died._

“…Did she suffer?” he asked, his voice tight with tears.

Nivea hesitated. “I-I’m sure it was--”

“Tell me the truth.”

Aziza sighed and told him while staring at her own tea, “…Apparently it was utter agony. If you ask me the poor woman didn’t die quickly enough, but the bastards wanted her to suffer.”

“Aziza!” Faizal exclaimed in dismay and anger.

The woman glared back at him. “He asked for the truth, Papa. He obviously can’t stand not knowing, especially since he loved her so much.”

“…I still love her,” Martin said, closing his eyes against the pain of knowing he was alive and hadn’t been able to do anything to save Minerva. She did not deserve that death, she’d deserved as long a life as possible, growing old in peace, surrounded by dozens of grandchildren playing around her. No, she’d died by a coward’s hand, barely forty-five years old, her last moments filled with unimaginable pain. “…Where is…Where does she rest?”

He needed to see her, to kneel at her grave and beg for forgiveness, pray for absolution once again, to tell her that he would have died for her each and every time her life was in danger, hers or their son’s.

“Here,” Nivea said, getting to her feet. “Before the city was sacked we…moved her body into a sarcophagus so that it would rest near…well, you. At first it was kept secret but once I was crowned and the truth came out, you’ve both worshipped in the Temple as saints.”

He closed his eyes for a moment and stood. Resting near him. Never with him.

The priestess took out a key and motioned for them to follow, “The crypt is just through there, Your Majesty…Your son and his wife are there too.” She opened a door that revealed a set of stairs that led deeper underground. Martin followed her down, not knowing what he would do once he saw their resting place. He could only think of remaining in the Temple, going into Akatosh’s service yet again, seeking atonement for Minerva’s death.

A short corridor led to a wooden door, and the priestess opened the door. Martin stepped into the crypt, his heart beat painfully hard as he stared at the three sarcophagi within, surrounded by torches that shone brightly from the walls. He took shaky steps towards them, wanting a closer look at the stone effigies.

Minerva’s was immediately recognizable. Hers was of a sharp-featured woman lying in repose, long wavy hair strewn beneath her, clad in ornate armor and clutching the hilt of the familiar silver sword Minerva used throughout the Crisis. He stared at the face, wondering if it was true to life, if Minerva’s face had changed so much from the one he’d known. Nearly thirty years…

His gaze lingered on it before he looked at the other two. Next to Minerva was the effigy of a wizened man with long hair and a short beard. Somehow it was relieving to know his son had lived such a long life. Next to him was the carved form of an old woman in unfamiliar garb, her hair appearing to be an impossible length. His son’s wife right beside him.

Martin sighed heavily, not knowing what he could say, what to think. He laid his hand on the stone hands of Minerva’s effigy, the hard pulse of his heart beat reminding him of all that separated them forever. Why he’d returned, he knew not. He just knew it was quite the apt punishment.

He looked up, frowning at realizing he’d heard some manner of muffled noise from very close by. It was prolonged and almost…human-like.

“What’s that noise…?” Aziza asked from behind him.

Faizal replied after a moment, “I can’t hear anything.”

Martin strained his ears for the sound, catching it again. “It’s coming from in here, but…” He listened hard, hearing it die out into silence for a few moments before it began again.

It kept happening and it finally sounded like a wail, a scream. Martin’s heart gave a hard thud yet again as his eyes fell on Minerva’s sarcophagus and he heard the muffled scream again. _No, it can’t be…_ He looked over his shoulder and caught Aziza’s gaze as it traveled to Minerva’s effigy.

Her eyes grew wide and she shuddered as she covered her mouth with a trembling hand, “Oh, _fuck me.”_

Faizal screamed, “The _sarcophagus?!”_

“Impossible! Aziza, check!” Nivea commanded, her hand fluttering to the glowing gem on her chest.

Martin anxiously watched as Aziza focused her gaze on the sarcophagus and felt the rush of energy as she hissed in an otherworldly voice, “ _Laas Yah Nir”._

Suddenly the space was aglow with life-force, Martin able to see the pulsating glow coming from Aziza, Nivea, Faizal, the priestess…

…The writhing figure within the confines of the sarcophagus.

The spell ended when Aziza screamed, “Shit, _she’s alive!”_

Martin suddenly began to pull at the cover, roaring in desperation when it barely moved an inch. “MINERVA!” he shouted, deaf and blind to everything else save for the fact that Minerva was in there, alive, _screaming_. “Minerva, it’s me! I’m here!” Gods, he prayed she could hear him, prayed she had enough air, prayed she’d hear him and realize she was safe. “ _Help me get this thing open!”_ he shouted at the others.

Aziza pushed alongside him, her strength acute and enough to move the cover.

_Minerva kneeling at the altar in Kvatch, seeing her face for the first time when she turned to look at him with her exhausted yet determined gaze._

He heard the pained gasps clear as day when the damned cover finally came off, heard Nivea’s shocked oath just before the cover hit the floor with a resounding crash.

_Minerva kissing him awake in the morning, her face free of fear and worry, his heart lighter than it had been in years._

Martin looked into the sarcophagus, his breaths trembling with fear, expectation, a wild half-joy that wanted to become whole.

Her face.

So different from how he remembered it.

But there was no mistaking her eyes.

_He stared into green depths one last time, silently begging her to forgive him for the pain he was about to cause her. He had to do this. He had to save her._

Minerva Saturnius, the woman who had yanked him out of his stupor of silence and guilt, who fought in his name day in and day out. She lay in the sarcophagus, alive and gasping for breath.

There were lines along the corners of her mouth, tiny wrinkles along the corners of her eyes. Her features were slightly thinner. Her hair was so much longer, black tresses curling slightly at the ends. Her shoulders strong and solid as ever. Her entire body shrouded only in a black dress made of thin material. Her hands held before her, shaking violently and _bleeding_.

The sigh that escaped him was wracked with dismay and horror. She’d nearly torn her hands apart beating at the stone. _Nine, how long was she in here…?_

She was still gasping, whimpering brokenly as her lips struggled for words. Her eyes that locked on his face and he held her gaze, taking in every beautiful change in her features, committing them to memory and smiling down at her as he fell in love all over again.

“Minerva,” he breathed, reaching for her hand to gently take it in his. She was _here_ , they were finally _together…_

Minerva brought bloodied hands to her mouth as she began to scream again.


	2. i'll love you another time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claustrophobia and injury warning.

_Gaius._

_Oh, don’t cry, baby, it’s okay._

_You’re going to be fine, you’re so brave, you’re my brave boy, Guy._

He was weeping, he was hurt. He was holding her so tightly. _Guy, let me go, it’s alright._

It was as though her innards were tearing each other apart, blood and bile seeping between her teeth as her son wept above her, shaking his head in desperation.

_He was holding her other hand, his grip not as strong as the vice-like grip on her wrist, tugging her in the other direction._

_Wait._

He released her, their parting like a line finally snapping in two, an explosion tearing everything in twain. Surprise, shock, and then fear that she hadn’t felt _years_.

Minerva remembered it, or it was happening still. No, it was a memory.

Memory that suddenly disappeared, replaced by the sensation of a thousand daggers in her stomach. _This…already happened…I died then, right?_

The pain stopped and Minerva’s eyes flew open, but it made no difference.

Everything was pitch black. Everything was silent. Everything was cold.

Minerva blinked furiously, strained to remember what had happened between then and…

Where was now? When was now?

 _It’s dark…It’s cold…_ She was clutching something cold in her hands, felt and realized it was the hilt of a sword. She let go, her hands wandering over the thin, silky material she was wearing.

Then she touched stone, cold and hard.

Her palm flattened against it, her knees bumped it painfully. It was all around her, there was no light whatsoever.

“…What…?” She sounded so muffled. The space was so small, impossibly small. She breathed hard, her heart beating like a drum as she hit the stone once, twice, several times as her breaths grew more desperate, her lungs thirsting for air they knew was precious.

“…Help…” Her hands curled into fists as she beat the stone harder, the skin on her knuckles shredded by the repeated motion. Minerva barely noticed the pain, a scream of pure terror building in her throat as she felt her fingers grow slippery with blood. “ _HELP! SOMEONE HELP! GET ME OUT OF HERE! GAIUS!”_

Where was he? Why had he put her here?

She remembered the horror on his face as he held her, his tears through the pain that tore her apart. She slowed down enough to feel the pain in her hands and realized.

_He thinks I’m dead…_

She only realized she had resumed her desperate clawing against the stone when she felt the crack of a fingernail but she didn’t stop. Refused to stop, she would not _die_ screaming for air.

_No, I remember. I saw them again. Mother. Father. Gaius…Martin._

Burning pain lanced through her arm, her ring and little fingers snapping and finally making her stop, but not her screams. She howled as hard as she could, her lungs and throat burning.

_Please. Please, I don’t want to die like this._

A small part of her wanted to give in. It hurt too much to continue. She silenced it with her screams, willing to go on for hours if possible, refusing go die in silence.

A scrape.

She sucked in a breath, quiet and straining her ears to hear it again. That came from outside, it had to be from the outside. She tried to get her breathing under control, didn’t want her shudders to keep her from hearing the voices.

Louder scraping broke through, along with _light at last_ , blinding in its brilliance and making Minerva bring her bloody hands up to cover her eyes. Two. Two people were moving the slab, and she heard it crash to the ground, freeing her and giving her much-needed air to breathe.

She took great gulping breaths, her chest on fire and shock trickling through her as she finally looked at her hands. Indeed the ring and little fingers of her right hand looked broken, but her hands in general looked horrible, blood dripping down her wrists as she held them up.

She nearly didn’t notice the pair of blue-grey eyes staring down at her.

His eyes. His face hovering above her, unchanged, the same robe he’d been wearing when he…

Minerva looked up at Martin’s face for the first time in twenty-seven years, watched it shift from shock to worry, until he finally smiled in the way that had never failed to make her feel like she was the only other person who existed in his world.

“Minerva,” he whispered, his hand reaching toward her.

She screamed, terror and fury worse than being trapped making her clamber away from him and out of the sarcophagus. She saw him looking at her with fear in his eyes before he edged towards her, his hand still outstretched.

 _“NO!”_ She backed into the wall of what she realized was a crypt. There were two other sarcophagi along with the one she’d just emerged out of. She shook her head, wanting to weep, wanting to scream more at the cruelty of it. It was too much, the perfection of it crushing her, suffocating her. “Oh, Nine, no…No no no no, please, this can’t be happening…”

He came closer, saying in an agonized, soft voice, “My love, please--”

She swatted at him with her bloody hand, finally noticing the four other flabbergasted people in the room. “ _GET AWAY!”_ she shouted at them all, glaring at the…apparition in front of her. “What am I doing in this crypt?! Why was I brought here?!”

One of the others, a woman in what appeared to be scaled armor, brazenly approached her. “Look…Let’s just keep calm…”

Minerva shouted at her, making her freeze in her tracks, _“Where is my son?!”_ She needed to see Gaius safe, needed to show him she was alive. Anything to wipe the memory of his tears from her mind, so they could both _breathe_ again, completely sure that they were both safe.

The man wearing Martin’s face got closer still, voice desperate as he entreated, “Minerva, believe me…I’m real, I’m here! I swear on my very life!”

She turned towards the imposter, her heart clenching at hearing him say words she’d wanted to hear for so many years. She shook her head, refusing to be taken in. “…Whoever you are…how _cruel_ can you be to stoop to such illusions?”

“It _is_ me, Minerva,” he repeated, and she saw that his face was stained with soot and blood the way she remembered from that horrible day. He glanced around, as if trying to grasp something, and finally asked, “Do you remember attempting magic on the training grounds? You kept healing rather than attacking and you were nearly frozen from my frost spells, remember?”

Minerva trembled, the memory emerging out of the back of her mind. The details were no longer perfectly clear, but she did remember his laughter as she’d glared at him, cold and wet.

“Do you remember Phillida’s murder?” he asked, hope shining through his voice. Minerva found herself slightly lowering her hands, still yearning for him after so long, wanting to believe and knowing it was so impossible. “You told me you’d wanted to make him suffer yourself. You wanted to make him pay for everything he did to you in that prison, and so did I.”

He did. He had listened and understood her anger, never looked at her as if she were evil for wanting to hurt Phillida back for humiliating her. “…You remember that…?”

Martin nodded, his smile returning. The sight of it made Minerva’s head swim as her heart slammed in her chest. “Of course I do. Remember one morning I came out of my room and you started laughing at the ridiculous state of my hair? Poor Baurus tried to contain himself and had to leave the hall, but I still heard him.”

She was dizzy with the intensity of her heart beat, a constant _yes yes yes_ drumming in her chest as reason battled with every wish she’d made since she was eighteen and alone. Minerva looked at his face, the stained fabric of his robes, his broad, long-fingered hands reaching for her, and the agony of the years built up in her throat. She let out a shuddered sob, finally letting her broken hands fall to her sides. “…I saw you die. I watched you turn into…Y-you didn’t come back…”

Guilt filled his features, but it still took her breath away to see them again. Nothing had changed. Unlike her, time had left him virtually untouched. “I’m so sorry…for all the pain I caused you, for…for everything. I never wanted to leave you that way, but I had to save you. I wanted you to live, Minerva.”

Minerva clung to the sound of his voice, the voice he shared with their son, the words filled to the brim with devotion. He was looking at her, his eyes roaming her surely terrifying form, finally returning to her face and filling with worry and yearning.

It would kill her, it would be the thing to finally end her if this was only a lie, just a wild dream she was having or some form of torture. Still, Minerva swallowed and called out, “…Martin?”

He nodded, beaming at her and stretching his hand out once again. Minerva stared at it, her fear battling with her loneliness, and found herself reaching for him, in spite of the continuous pangs of pain in her hand. _He’ll disappear. This will all fade and it’ll be a dream._

Her fingertips touched his, her blood staining his skin.

She saw it, joy flooding her heart to the point where she swiftly moved to wrap her arms around him, ignoring the ache in her hands, burying her face in his neck and breathing, feeling the heat of his skin against hers.

He was solid, alive, and breathing in her arms. She flattened her palm against his chest with a wince and felt it, his strong heartbeat beneath her hand, and her tears broke free as his arms held her tight.

 _He’s real_ , she sang in her mind, over and over again. _He’s real, he’s here, he’s holding me again…_ He was alive, these were _his_ arms around her, his hands stroking her back to soothe and touch for the sake of feeling her. Not the wretched final embrace that he’d given Minerva little chance to fully appreciate.

Then he gently disentangled them, bringing his hands to carefully wrap around Minerva’s wrists. He held her ruined hands between them and Minerva flinched at the sight of them.

He breathed worriedly, “Gods, your hands…” Then soothing healing magic reached from his flesh to hers, coaxing her broken fingers back together and closing the open wounds. Minerva swallowed and used a healing spell of her own, sighing in relief when she could finally straighten her fingers and he could grasp them perfectly in his hands.

She clutched him tightly, knowing it was ridiculous but still fearing that he would disappear if she let him go. She filled her gaze with his face, taken back to the race to the Temple, his face determined while she was trying to figure out how they would survive the next few minutes. Untouched. As if no time had passed at all.

Gentle blue eyes roamed her face and Minerva was suddenly aware of how many years had passed, the slight changes in her appearance as she grew older, raised a child, watched her granddaughter being born. She kept her face upturned, praying he found her there.

“You’re both really here,” she heard, and she turned towards the voice, finding the four others still standing there. Her chest tightened at the sight of the two women, suddenly unable to stop looking at them. The woman from earlier, standing tall and looking right at her, gaze proud and unflinching. A much older woman, silver-haired and delicate, tears falling from her eyes.

The feeling she got looking at them was so familiar, enough that she remembered _who_ she’d wanted to see upon getting out of the sarcophagus. “Guy!” she exclaimed, joy surging into her chest much more powerfully than it had moments before as she realized that Martin was _here_ , and their son was…

She turned to Martin as her eyes filled with tears, suddenly unable to stop smiling as she thought of how _happy_ Guy would be, how they would all finally be together as a family. “I have to take you to Guy! He has to know I’m fine and that _you’re_ here!” She held on to his hand and began to lead him out of the room, but he inhaled sharply and stayed put, making her stop in her tracks.

Confused and anxious, Minerva turned and found that the smile had gone from his face, replaced by pain. “…What is it? We have to go, Martin!” she urged, needing to see them together, needing to see Martin hold their son in his arms.

Martin shuddered out, “Minerva…” He shut his eyes and shook his head before looking at the others, and Minerva turned to see the old woman slowly walking towards them, closely followed by an older man.

She said in a gentle tone, “It is…the two-hundred and eleventh year of the Fourth Era…Not the twenty-seventh, my Lady. It’s been two centuries since the Crisis ended.”

Minerva blinked at her, her heart a hammer, beating out a denial even when her mind was struggling to comprehend what the woman had said. “… _What?”_ she asked, voice cracking as she let go of Martin’s hands. Two centuries. An impossible amount of years for…

The armored woman spoke up, looking sympathetic even through her sharp eyes. “Your son, Gaius. He lived a very long life…A century. He died an old man in his bed.” She put a hand on the sarcophagus next to Minerva’s, upon the brow of an old, bearded man carved into an effigy.

_Your son, Gaius. He died._

Those words stood out as if they’d been shouted. As if they’d been scrawled throughout the city walls, the letters big enough for all to see. Minerva didn’t breathe, didn’t seem to remember how. She shook her head, not wanting to think that _she was alive and her son was dead_. She stared at the effigy she did not recognize, mind screaming at the thought of her baby’s bones lying there. Her chest heaved as she approached the sarcophagus with faltering steps, and she remembered being young and finding Guy, only a toddler, dozing in her bed, his black hair disheveled.

She touched the stone with shaking hands, a pained moan escaping her before she could bring a hand to her mouth. She looked up and saw the third sarcophagus, effigy showing a woman with long, flowing hair. _Inga_ …

“We put the three of you here…with Martin,” the woman explained and Minerva could feel her heart break for the second time in her life. Tears trickled down her cheeks as she turned to look at Martin, his anguished gaze on the same sarcophagus.

She wanted to scream, to tear and destroy as she realized fate would always be against them. Against her. She would never have them _both_ in her life at the same time. Her fingers traced the face of the effigy for the briefest of moments before she tore herself away and ran out of the room, ignoring the cries from behind her as she ran up the stairs into what appeared to be a living area.

She went to the huge wooden doors and pushed them open, gasping at the blast of cold air that hit her just as her eyes beheld just where she was.

The Temple of the One, open to the night sky and totally bare. Minerva stepped outside and stared at the space where Martin had stood and shattered the Amulet of Kings, where a stone dragon had once stood, the sight of it spurring Minerva’s dreams and nightmares for so many years.

She shivered violently, finally realizing that it was all true. She was not in her own time, no longer in the same time as her son, Inga, Minny, Helvedur.

All of them gone.

Footsteps alerted her to Martin’s approach and he appeared in front of her, removing his thick outer robe and bringing it over her shoulders to wrap her in it, and suddenly she was enveloped in warm. “You’re freezing,” he murmured, his gaze loving and apologetic all at once, and Minerva felt a familiar love bloom in her chest as she looked at him. She clutched at the robe and took a step forward to press her lips to his, her inhale sharp as her skin tingled. His hands gently held her arms, and she prayed that they could remain like that. She had wanted this for so long, wanted it still, and swore she would hold on to it as long as possible.

They parted, silently gazing at each other before Minerva turned to the others, their presence tugging at her heart like it always had with…with Gaius. “…Who are you all?”

The younger woman replied, “Your descendants through Gaius.” She touched her chest and said, “I’m Aziza Septim…” She then gestured to the old woman, Minerva noticing the softly glowing gem at her chest. “And this is my mother, Nivea Septim, Empress of Tamriel.”

She stared at them both as if she were staring at Guy, her chest tightening when she noticed that their eyes were the same green she always saw when she looked in a mirror.


	3. have you lost the same things I have lost?

Minerva wiped the fog from the mirror and looked at herself, her complexion finally back to normal after having cleaned off the mess of whatever was used to give her face a lively color. It was the same face she always saw when she looked in a mirror; lovely to look at, well-aged, and very typically Imperial. 

She was glad she’d thought of cleaning up before looking in a mirror, not sure if she would have been able to stomach the sight of herself looking like a painted corpse. She peered down at her nude form, relieved that she recognized every scar, every muscle. She touched the old scar above her left hip, recalling the thrill of Martin’s gentle touch when he healed the wound. That feeling hadn’t vanished at least. Of course she hadn’t expected it to, having kept Martin in her heart for nearly thirty years.

 _Two-hundred and ten years_ , she thought, going over everything she had learned from…her descendants. Minerva couldn’t resist a smile at the thought, realizing why she could barely tear her eyes away from them much like when she’d watched Minny being born. Her children, Martin’s children. Living proof of what she and Martin had in those months at Cloud Ruler Temple.

She touched the slightly faded stretch marks on her belly, the lines around her mouth. What did he see when he looked at her? Certainly not the young woman who had stormed through an Oblivion Gate and the ruins of Kvatch just to get him to safety. _Maybe he does see that. Maybe he sees the mother of his son…A son he never knew…_

_A son who’s dead._

Minerva tried to keep the agony of the thought at bay, telling herself that Guy had lived an incredibly long life. As much as it ached, Minerva knew that his being dead wasn’t the worst thing. No, the worst was thinking for a brief moment that she would finally see Guy and Martin in the same room, see her son finally meet the father he yearned for, and hear Martin tell him that he loved him, and then realizing that none of it would ever come to pass.

She jumped when she heard a shrill roar from far off, her heart thundering when she realized what it was. A dragon. A real, flesh and blood dragon. Creatures of legend that her descendant was _somehow_ able to kill and take power from. Minerva had to repeat it all over and over in her head to fully accept that her descendants were Dragonborn in many senses of the word. That Nivea was the first Septim to sit on the throne since Uriel.

All of it reminding her of just how many years had passed, that her son’s bones lay in that silent crypt. She reminded herself that he had lived a long life with Inga, and if she tried hard enough she could remember watching him live that life from…wherever she’d been.

She remembered welcoming her beloved Minny when she had died young. She remembered her heart breaking for Nivea when her father struck her. She remembered boundless joy whenever a child was born, watching their eyes open to a world that existed thanks to Martin’s sacrifice.

 _Gods!_ She remembered discovering the rest of her family. A paternal cousin who looked so like her and, like Martin, had been in Sanguine’s cult. Minerva stopped trying to remember, even if her heart thirsted for those images of the three of them together, her and Martin with Gaius, finally together. It took far too much effort to try and see through hazy memories.

So much she wanted to think about, if only to forget about how she'd died. 

How she'd shaken so violently when she took the cup of tea Nivea had offered her that she nearly dropped it, her stomach and throat tight with terror as a horrible cold dragged through her body. Martin had taken the cup from her, and she'd been unable to meet the worry in his eyes.

Minerva heard the rustle of sheets and jumped in surprise before remembering that there was a partition shielding her while she bathed, and Martin had stayed on the other side of it, never intruding on her privacy. Her emotions were a complete jumble and she still felt somehow…afloat, like a boat with no mooring.

 _I suppose that happens after you return from the dead._ She shook her head and finished drying off so she could finally put some warm clothes and boots on. It had been spring at the time of Tolisi’s betrayal, but now it was the midst of winter and Martin’s robe had been the only thing keeping her fingers from falling off from the cold. She looked at the wool shirt Aziza had provided for her and lifted it up to rub her cheeks against it with a relieved smile. It was warm.

Minerva stepped out from behind the screen to find Martin dressed in plain clothing, his blood and soot stained Imperial robes set on the floor next to Minerva’s discarded dress. Looking at him it struck her that time hadn’t touched him at all, that for him it had been mere hours since he shattered the Amulet and defeated Mehrunes Dagon.

He looked at her too, as if unsure of what to say. Minerva could only blurt out what she was thinking. “…You didn’t change at all.”

His responding smile was so brief she nearly missed it, quickly replaced by that sad gaze she used to know so well. He stepped closer to her, slowly as though expecting her to shy away from him, his smile returning when she let him take her hands in his. “You’re so beautiful,” he said softly, looking right at her and making her heart throb wildly.

“I don’t really look the same as I did--”

“It’s still you, isn’t it?” he asked. “You’re still the woman who walked into Kvatch and saved everyone left alive.” His blue eyes filled with that same wonder she remembered, the same wonder that would make her flush and hide her face in his neck. His hands curled warmly around hers, and he added in a much softer tone, “…You kept our son safe.”

She fell into his arms at hearing him call Guy theirs, pressing kisses to his jaw and letting tears fall from her eyes. “I missed you so much,” she sobbed, pouring every ounce of truth into those words, every agony, every bit of the joy she was feeling.

He held her tightly, a hand stroking up the length of her back and catching strands of her hair as he turned his face to kiss her cheek and reach her lips. He kissed her hungrily, making her gasp in surprise and her heart pick up speed. She raised her trembling hands to bury them in his hair, marveling at its softness, and let him taste her, losing herself in the gentle pleasure she remembered so lovingly.

Familiar, lingering kisses and licks against her lips left her skin tingling, and she opened her eyes to find him gazing at her, skin flushed and eyes yearning. “I don’t want this to be a dream,” she managed through the haze in her head.

Sorrow flooded the peaceful blue of Martin’s eyes and he held her tighter, pressing his forehead to hers as his intense gaze drew hers, never letting go. “It’s not a dream, I promise. We’re both here. We’re with our…our descendants.” He let out a small chuckle, fondness in his eyes. “I can’t describe how it feels to look at them and see your eyes.”

Minerva beamed and hid her face in his chest, feeling his breaths and heartbeat, reassuring herself that this was real, that everything he was saying was real. He toyed with a long length of her hair, murmuring softly, “Your hair’s so long now…”

She laughed against his neck. A sharp set of knocks at the door pulled her out of her thoughts, making her straighten and clear her throat. “Who is it?”

“It’s Aziza.”

“Come in,” Minerva replied, dazed by the fact that a princess and _the_ Dragonborn was asking permission to enter a room.

The door opened, revealing Aziza and the inhuman aura that always seemed to follow, along with a package beneath one arm and another on the floor. She brought both packages inside and shut the door behind her, wearing a smirk and saying, “Well, Grandmother, you’re certainly looking a lot less embalmed.”

Martin made a choking noise and Minerva hid a snort behind her hand. Aziza heaved the packages onto the bed and turned to ask Minerva, “You don’t mind if we just call you ‘Grandmother’, right? ‘Great-great-great…however-many-great-Grandmother’ would just sound ridiculous.”

Minerva reluctantly pulled herself away from Martin to reply properly, “Of course I don’t mind.”

Aziza looked at her for a few moments, her gaze disconcertingly familiar until Minerva remembered the often frightening intensity of her mother’s gaze. Biting her lip, the younger woman gestured towards the package. “I bought some clothes for you two. Can’t really have you running about in burial dress or royal robes.”

Martin carefully opened the nearest package, revealing a couple of sets of winter clothing. Everything looked well-made and very new. He gave Aziza an astonished look and asked, “You bought these yourself?”

Aziza nodded, giving him a wry grin. “I may be Empress one day if I don’t freeze to death in Skyrim, but I can still do some things for myself.”

“That’s a good way of looking at things,” Martin agreed.

Bringing attention to the remaining package, Aziza said, “This is yours, Grandmother.”

Minerva raised a brow at the soft solemnity in Aziza’s voice, opening the package with no clue as to what she’d find. A familiar sheen made her gasp sharply and she drew the cloth and paper away to reveal the gift. “Is…Is this my…?”

“Your mithril cuirass,” Aziza confirmed, pleased by Minerva’s reaction. “The family’s kept it safe for years, even if no one’s been bold enough to wear it.”

Minerva picked the cuirass up, possibly more awestruck than when she originally received the armor. Silvery and comfortable, Minerva had treasured it. Martin studied it, obviously impressed. “This is beautiful,” he breathed.

“Isn’t it? It was a gift from Millona Umbranox,” Minerva explained, her voice bright at the memory. “There was no saying no to that woman once she set her mind to something. The last I wore it was a week before…”

_Before I died._

Her voice trailed off and Martin suddenly had a dark look, guilt showing itself in a deep frown. Aziza, sensing the sudden shift in mood, said slowly, “If you need anything else, just ask for it. The Tower’s yours to use as you see fit.”

“Wait,” Minerva said, suddenly apprehensive about spending the night in the palace. It was too unfamiliar, too sudden after all that had happened, and she just wanted to go home. “Aziza,” she began hesitantly. “Is anyone living in my…I mean…where I used to live?”

She had to remember that perhaps it wasn’t her home anymore. She tried searching foggy memories of all she’d seen when dead, but even trying exhausted her.

To her relief, Aziza gave her an understanding smile that softened the ferocity in her eyes. “No. Not since Mother was crowned. My husband and I have taken our son to stay there when things get go mad in this tower and we just want some quiet, but no one’s staying there now.”

Minerva bit her lip thoughtfully before turning to look at Martin. “…Martin…I think…right now I’d rather be at home, if that’s alright with you.”

His eyes filled with understanding so quickly that Minerva drew a sharp breath. “Of course, we’ll go anywhere you want.”

She gave him a grateful smile and turned to Aziza. “Is it too much trouble, Aziza?”

The younger woman shook her head no. “None at all. The house is yours to do with as you please.”

“Thank you,” Minerva breathed.

 

* * *

 

Minerva had traveled across the whole of Cyrodiil, explored the dark below of Skyrim, run through the Wastes of Oblivion and been in the utter infinity of Aetherius. Yet the place she had died in seemed the realest place she had ever known in these past few hours of her resurrection. 

Minerva removed her cloak and folded it before placing it on the chair next to Aziza’s little desk. She looked around at the room and realizing with a hard pang that she’d never stopped thinking of this little room as hers, even centuries after her death.

Aziza had slept here like her mother before her. Lucius did too, the poor, pathetic, misguided boy. Before that the twins, Cassio and Silas. Petros and Cesare and Mini. All of them the children of her body and heart, residing in the home she’d known her entire life, a home she’d been terrified to return to at one point before she realized the time was right.

Strange to find herself back here, more so to see Martin standing in the threshold with a small smile on his face.

Stranger still that there was still a sliver of anger in her heart at him for leaving her.

“So this was your room,” he said in soft wonder. “I wish I could have seen how it looked back then.”

“I do too,” she replied, the coolness in her voice very evident. She inhaled sharply and sat down on the edge of the bed.

Martin entered the room and was in front of her, the simplicity of his clothes recalling a time when he was still coming to terms with his newfound role. When he’d been completely hers and she tried to picture herself making the White-Gold Tower her home. He knelt in front of her and took her calloused hands in his. The tender gesture made her stare at his face, finding concern in blue-gray eyes she adored so much.

He softly said, “I thought this would make you happy, love.”

Her heart threatening to shatter, Minerva reached up to stroke his face as her throat tightened. “It does, I  _am_  happy, Martin, it’s just…” She drew her hand back and covered her eyes as her tears broke through along with a shaky sob. She felt Martin sit down beside her and take her in his arms, but as much as she wanted to sink into the comfort she’d yearned for all the remaining years of her life she tore herself away and got to her feet, overwhelmed by how  _human_  she felt. Nothing was simple anymore, nothing was painless.

Martin held on to her hand silent as worry radiated from him and Minerva stared out the window, Masser visible over the city walls as it always had been. The view had spared her having to see the statue. “…You have…no idea what it did to me…waking up in that room Ocato gave me and having to see… _that_  outside my window every morning.”

“Minerva…” he began, but she shook her head, her back still to him.

“I was pregnant. I felt this life inside of me but none of it could fill the emptiness I felt in my heart. I had to lie in bed, thinking about how I could possibly tell this child that its father was dead!” She turned to face him, his face falling at the sight of her tears. “You died and left me alone. Your  _noble_  sacrifice nearly killed me, and I had to  _live_  with that! Your  _son_  had to live with that, Martin!”

His eyes filled with pain and she hated to see it, but there was still a stubborn set to his jaw as he replied, “There was no way to escape it, Minerva. It was my destiny. My  _duty_.”

She shot back, “Don’t give me that! If there was a price to pay, I should have been the one to pay it! I was your Blade, sworn to lay down my life for yours! There had to be another way!” 

“And if there was? Would you have killed yourself? Our son?” he asked, a challenge in his broken voice.

The question cut deep. “Do you think I never thought about that? What an impossible choice that would have been if I’d known? All I knew back then, _in_  that Temple, was that the Empire needed  _you_  more than it needed me!”

He stepped forward and held her shoulders in a strong grip, relentlessly holding her gaze with his piercing one. “No. It needed you and all you could offer. You still had years ahead of you, and I had lived my life and accepted my fate. All that mattered was that _you_ had the chance to live out your life in peace. And if I’d known you were with child my choice would have been easier: I would have given my life a thousand times so that he would live, and he did. Our son had a long, peaceful life, and I was glad to lay down mine if only for that!”

She broke down then, nearly thirty years of raw loss making its way out of her in torrents of tears as she returned to his embrace and cried onto his shoulder. “It  _hurt_ ,” she gasped. “It never stopped hurting…”

“I know,” he said against her hair, voice rough with emotion. “That remains my only regret.”

Minerva let him hold her, letting the sincerity in his words be the balm she’d always wished for. She calmed herself enough to catch her breath and say shakily, “Of course I’m happy. Having you here…it’s everything I dreamed, Martin. I just…I can’t lose you again. We’ll die again one day, but I cannot bear to watch you leave me that way again.”

Martin’s hand stroked her hair back and wiped the tears from her face, the motions more comforting than she’d thought possible. Her pain, truly acknowledged, could perhaps finally leave her in peace. “I will try not to, Minerva.”

She nodded, knowing it was all she would get. She had learned promises were hard to keep long ago. But in a few short hours she was so tired, yet her heart was lighter. Martin was truly here, not a figment of her imagination or the pure eternity of Aetherius.

But there were shadows that would cling to her soul, and she doubted they would ever leave her. It was only fair that she tell him everything, just as he'd told her. “Martin…I want to be completely honest with you.” He looked at her, worried, as if she still had some awful news to give him. “…I’m not…Sometimes I…” She hated herself for her hesitation, tearing herself away from him and “Damn it! There are some mornings when I just don’t want to get up! The thought of it is exhausting in every way. I’d rather sleep and just forget I even exist!”

It was true. There had been many a morning when she would just lay in bed, closing her eyes and willing herself to sleep even as her son called for her.

She heard Martin ask, “This began after…?”

“After the Crisis, yes,” she answered, keeping her eyes on her boots. “I spent an entire week afterward just sleeping, crying, on and off for hours, trying to eat and drink, trying to avoid looking out the fucking window and seeing that statue. By the end of the week I was tired of it…I wanted to…to at least try to get up, to eat a proper meal, to walk outside.” It had been such an effort, harder than making her lonely way through Paradise. “Then I found out I was pregnant and I thought, ‘This is it. I’ll never feel that sad, that alone, ever again.’ Until it happened again two weeks later, and I just…lay in bed for most of the day, closing my eyes and trying not to hear anything.” She had hated herself for feeling such listlessness, for not feeling grateful that she was alive. “Gods, and then the _nightmares_ …There were times I didn’t even know what was real anymore. I thought I was back in Paradise, that I was back in a cage, that I was in a cave and the daedra were close to finding me!

“…None of it ever stopped, and I _wanted_ it to. I didn’t want Guy to come in and see me just lying there. I didn’t want him to hear me crying, but he did, bless his little heart, he did.” She clutched herself, wishing she could go back and hold that precious boy in her arms. “He asked if I was sick, if there was anything he could do, and all I could do was look at him, hold on to him just to tell myself that I was safe, that he wasn’t in danger…” Years of hoping it would end, that she would be able to wake up and never feel such despair. “…I started locking my door as soon as Minny began walking…because I didn’t want to risk her seeing me in that state,” she admitted, shaking her head and adding sardonically, “The Champion of Cyrodiil! Forty-five years old and still terrified of the dark! Fuck, I can’t even so much as _hold_ a cup of tea without wanting to vomit anymore!”

She sat back down on her bed, still looking at her boots as she trembled anxiously. “That’s what I have to bear every single day, Martin...”

Minerva shut her eyes until feeling his hands tenderly stroke through her hair, and she felt him pull her head forward until their foreheads touched. She opened her eyes and looked into his, their ferocity matching Aziza's. “…And this is the man who loves you and wants to help you bear it, Minerva. Years ago you accepted me and my past. You accepted the darkness in my heart. How could I not do the same?” He pressed a brief kiss to her lips, hand fiercely curling over the back of her neck. “I love you, Minerva. That much hasn’t changed in two centuries, and it never will.”

She smiled at him through her tears, managing to tell him, "I love you too, I never stopped." Minerva brought her fingers up to trace the familiar planes of his face recalling how she tried so hard to paint a vivid image in Guy's mind so he had a sense of what his father looked like. The memory made her throat seize and she whispered as fresh tears flowed, "...And Guy loved you."

She felt Martin stiffen and opened her eyes to see her own heartache mirrored in his eyes. “…He looked like you. I remember that.”

Minerva nodded, glad that he knew their son's face. “He was so talented, so brave…”

Martin got to his feet, covering his mouth with his hand and taking deep breaths, and she could see him shaking with every exhale. After a moment he looked at her, lost and filled with grief. “I want my son too, Minerva…I want to tell him I’m proud of him. I want to look at him and see your eyes, your hair, your smile.

“It killed me…realizing I was alive and you were dead…Worse still when Aziza told me how you died.” He harshly drew a hand through his hair, his voice shaky as he added, “I wanted to go back and kill every member of the Mythic Dawn. Tolisi. _All of them_ , if only I could save you.”

She stood and took him in her arms, bringing his hand to her heart to reassure him, not wanting him to experience that same, torturous guilt. They both stood there silent until Minerva said into the quiet, “It’s always either you or him, isn’t it? I can never have both of you with me at the same time.”

“That’s not true,” Martin said, his voice slightly steadier. “Those last few weeks…Every time you were in my arms…I was holding the both of you.” He held her tightly against his body and Minerva braced herself for the pain that would come hand in hand with joy.


	4. you're part of the past, but now you're the future

Martin woke to feel a weight on top of him, his hand wandering towards a familiar mass of thick hair as he first thought of the unpleasant reading he would have to do once he made his way to the great hall. 

He opened his eyes, finding an unfamiliar ceiling above him rather than the familiar one of Cloud Ruler Temple. His heart sped when he recalled everything that had happened and what he’d learned. There were no Oblivion Gates opening in the streets, and he was no longer the only Septim left on Nirn. He rubbed his eyes with his free hand and looked down at the head lying on his chest, a hand clutching at the front of his clothes.

There she was in deep repose, her breathing steady and her brow wrinkling slightly as his fingers stroked her hair.

Minerva had fallen asleep first, exhausted by shock, grief, and joy, and Martin held on to her slumbering form, wondering at the lonely years she must have spent in this room from the time she was sixteen. He felt a sense of awe at being in a space so integral to who Minerva was, a place where, from the kind of childhood she had, she could barely be herself. Later on it would be a place where she mourned and wondered, getting up the morning of her death and not knowing what was to come.

Mere hours after they fell asleep she began to whimper and cry out as if she were in pain. He stroked her forehead, holding her hands and whispering soothingly into her ear until she calmed and fell asleep again. His heart ached when he thought of the nightmares that surely haunted her from the moment she arrived in Kvatch, dark dreams that would likely haunt her for the rest of…this life.

Martin had also been startled awake by his own dreams, his throat shut as he watched blood pour from Minerva’s mouth as she fought for breath. He almost didn’t want to fall back to sleep, wanting to fill his gaze with Minerva, alive in his arms in spite of having truly suffered such an agonizing death.

He had gently pressed his hand to her belly, feeling it move with her breaths, and his restless mind calmed to the point where he could let sleep claim him. It would be the first real sleep he’d had in days having helped plan the battle in Bruma, set up the spell to open a gate to Paradise, and made the long journey to the Imperial City. He realized with a pang that, for the first time in months, he was waking up into a world where he wouldn’t have to worry about the Oblivion Gates. He thought it cruel how his time with Minerva all those years ago were marked by so much death and fear, even when he believed that those were the best days of his life thus far.

He stared at her face, still staggered by the sight of her and knowing they belonged to each other. After everything that had gone wrong in his life, he could barely believe the gods saw fit to let her cross his path. He drank in the sight of her like this, without the paint that gave a corpse the illusion of life. She was alive and he was with her. His fingers lightly traced over the fine lines adorning the corners of her eyes, then followed them to a thin scar along her temple.

Martin felt the soft quake along Minerva’s spine as she began to wake up, followed by a telling tension in her body and a grimace in her brow. Her hand roamed across his chest and her eyes flew open before she raised her head and stared at him, her eyes as round as he remembered them being. He smiled down at her, his hand stroking her hair, and murmured. “Good morning.”

If it would make Minerva smile as beautifully as she did in that morning, Martin was determined to spend the rest of his life wishing her a good morning. Her eyes glistened with tears and she hid her face in his neck. “I thought…” She sniffled and he felt her shake before her arms tightened around him. “For a moment I thought it was all a dream, but it…You’re really here…in my home, _with_ me…”

Martin closed his eyes and silently cursed himself for the years of anguish he’d caused her and for the mornings when she would open her eyes and find herself alone. He knew all too well how that felt, waking up on days when Minerva wasn’t in the temple, and he feared he would never see her again. “With you,” He agreed, hugging her back and basking in the warmth of her strong body.  “…I’m right here, I’m not leaving, and I love you. So much.”

“I love you too,” she said looking down at him and wiping off the tears clinging to her eyelashes. “I’m going to say that to you every single day for the rest of our lives.”

He looked up at her, his hands settling on her thighs as she straddled him slowly, without the ease with which she’d done it in the days before Bruma. His gaze traveled the length of her hair, ending at her waistline. He sat up, his hands curling around her waist as he placed a soft kiss on her bottom lip, followed by more along her jaw to the shell of her ear. Her hands clutched his shoulders almost desperately as they made his way to his neck.

Turning his gaze to her with a soft smirk, Martin watched a blush blossom across her face the way he loved so much.

He then watched it deepen when a growl came from her stomach, and Minerva let out a soft squeal before covering her face with her hands. “Blood of Talos, that’s embarrassing!”

Martin had to chuckle at her mild mortification, a bit relieved she had an appetite after he’d watched her suffer through the small meal and tea at the palace. “Aziza did say they had food and tea downstairs,” he offered.

Minerva lifted herself off of him with visible reluctance, moving towards the water pitcher and pouring the clear liquid into a bowl with an ease that belied the years away from this room.

* * *

“Sit down. I’ll make the tea.” 

Minerva made the demand before she realized she’d opened her mouth and, chagrined, closed her eyes as she clutched the unfamiliar teapot. Of all people, why ask that of Martin? Hadn’t he proved he would do everything within his power to keep her alive?

Then she felt the gentle press of his hand over hers and opened her eyes to find his filled with understanding. “Of course,” he said before going to sit at the table. She paused to look at him there, her heart flooding with wistfulness as she pictured three precious others sitting with him. Sighing she filled the kettle with water and placed it on the fire.

Once everything was ready Minerva sat at Martin’s side and lifted her cup to her lips. She closed her eyes and took a sip, stomach relaxing as she swallowed without trembling. A small victory, but she silently reveled in it nonetheless.

They ate in relaxed silence, Minerva sipping the last of her tea with the knowledge that she was safe in her home.

Martin asked, “Will we stay here, then?”

“I haven’t thought it all through, honestly,” she said, setting her cup aside to look at him. In truth it seemed easier and almost idyllic to stay in the Imperial City, but that presented some problems that Minerva didn't want to linger on too long. “…What do you want to do?”

“I’ll go anywhere you want me to," he answered earnestly. "It’s strange that yesterday…two hundred years ago I was barely getting used to the idea of becoming the Emperor, and now I find that it’s my descendant sitting on the throne. Before you came into my life I planned to live it in atonement, and finish my days quite likely alone and forgotten. At the time I felt like it was the least I deserved for everything I did.”

She remembered that quality of his clearly, reaching to take his hand in hers. “And now?”

He squeezed back on her hand, bringing it to his lips and kissing across her knuckles. “I don’t ever want to give you up. I want every morning to be like this. We can linger over a cup of tea and not worry about Oblivion Gates.”

Minerva's heart ached with the sweetness of the thought. “Now we only have to worry about dragons,” she said wryly.

His smile flickered briefly. “I forgot about them. But you get the idea. We can stay here or go anywhere you want. I’m not leaving you again.”

The relief she felt at his words was powerful, tears springing to her eyes. “Then let’s leave. Be by ourselves somewhere, start a life, anything. I don’t know exactly where. I’m just thinking of all the things I want to do with you. Everything I want to show you. To tell you…Where do we even begin?” 

Could she start from the awful moment of realization that he was gone for good? The moment she'd first felt Gaius moving inside of her? When she held their son in her arms and wished Martin were there to see how beautiful and perfect he was?

“Will you marry me?”

Minerva's eyes widened with surprise and a second later she answered, “Yes.” He had asked her before and she'd given him the same answer, and now that she knew just what she'd lost and wanted, Minerva could only give that answer. “Yes, _yes_.” Hands curling over his nape she pulled his head towards her and sealed their lips together, ecstatic and eager to believe that everything would turn out fine this time. Nothing would ever come between them again if Minerva could help it. She shuddered in bliss at the gentle force of their lips sliding together, at his soft moan when her fingers remembered how to tug at his hair the right way.

Breaking the kiss (her heart fluttering wildly at the look of yearning in his eyes), Minerva tugged Martin to his feet and led him out of the kitchen. At the bottom of the stairs Martin suddenly pulled her back into his arms and pressed her back against the wall, heat spreading through Minerva’s body when she looked up and saw pure _hunger_ flash across his eyes before he captured her lips again, her sharp gasp allowing his tongue entry while his hands roamed over her body.

She gave his bottom lip an eager suck when his hand delved beneath her shirt to cup her breast, her nipple stiffening at his gentle touch. Her knees shook as his lips left hers to nip her jaw and suck at her neck, his hand pressing against the hard muscles of her belly as it traversed lower and lower.

“Is this alright?” He asked hoarsely, and Minerva closed her eyes and moaned softly at the sound. It was everything she’d wanted and it was finally happening. 

“Upstairs,” she gasped, realizing she’d slide to the floor if this went on. “My room.” She pulled away from him, breath erratic with excitement as she somehow made her way up the stairs without losing her footing, pulling Martin along with her and giggling like the girl she’d been when they first met.

For a moment she could pretend she was still that hopeful girl. That they had lit the Dragonfires and they had made their way to her home, stealing precious hours together before their lives changed forever, Guy growing in her womb and having both parents around to welcome him into the world.

Minerva let those thoughts leave her head. There was no use in such imaginings, not when Martin was alive and holding her hand even if she was nearly three decades older than the girl who stormed into a burning city to save a prince. She could touch him again and he wouldn’t disappear.

The thought made her lose her breath and she barely felt it when the backs of her knees hit the edge of the bed and she fell on top of it, Martin hovering over her for a moment with a look of yearning before he kissed her again, tongue slipping between her parted lips. She fumbled to undo the drawstring of her trousers and tugged them and her underwear down as far as she could in her current position, managing to lower them just beneath her buttocks. She grasped his hand and brought it to her opening, trembling when he crooked his fingers over her clit.

She kept silent out of habit, her louder gasps and moans aborted before they made their way past her lips. The old instinct to keep silent came rushing back, smothering her whimpers with her fist pressed against her lips as Martin’s fingers moved deeper and made her writhe beneath him.

He nosed at her tightly fisted hand with a groan, and she felt his clothed and hard length press against her thigh. “Don’t keep quiet,” he ground out, his blue eyes burning as they gazed into hers, scorching out all other thoughts. There was only his voice as he said throatily, “It’s just us now, and I want to hear every little sound you make.”

She remembered how quiet they had to be, Jauffre and Burd a few feet outside of Martin’s room and painfully within earshot. Breathy gasps, the slide of skin against skin, soft whimpers, a rapturous moan swallowed by a kiss, Minerva biting into Martin’s shoulder when she was convinced her body was on fire, her nails digging trails into the skin of his back. Soft panting into each other’s mouths as they slowly calmed in the aftermath.

Letting out a shudder and hearing a sharp inhale from Martin, Minerva rolled her hips to meet his steady movements, closing her eyes as a moan sputtered out. In spite of the dizzying pleasure Martin was giving her, warmth managed to spread through Minerva’s chest at the thought of finally letting herself react to everything. She arched her back, voicing her ecstasy and rutting back into his fingers, working them in further. She turned her face and rubbed her cheek against his, keening as his hot breath and low moans vibrated in her ear.

She clutched the sheets beneath her, legs tensing along with her abdomen at the almost unbearable mounting pleasure. Minerva didn’t know if her cries were words or mere noise at that point, her head thrown back on the pillow as she thrust back against the fingers pressing against that sensitive spot that had her sobbing in pleasure. Martin was as relentless as she remembered; he’d usually give her release first either with his fingers or mouth, giving her refuge in arms that craved to hold her as much as she craved his love.

She was close, her cries increasing in volume as she clamped down on Martin’s fingers. Her eyes opened, searching until she found Martin’s blazing gaze, his mouth slightly open as he watched her fall apart at his hands, and she let out a broken shout as her orgasm hit her in intense waves. Martin coaxed her through it, the familiar tenderness in his eyes making her tremble uncontrollably. She closed her eyes and brought a shaking hand to her face, feeling Martin’s arms wrapping safely around her and his lips pressing loving kisses on her cheek. Her heart was filled to the brim with an onslaught of emotion, remembering how her dreams would end before even getting to this point and she’d awaken alone and tearful. 

His arms were still around her as her trembling subsided and she opened her eyes, turning to face him and filling her eyes with the sight of him bringing his hand to his mouth and licking them clean. She gave him a sweet smile, still too breathless to laugh. His other hand stroked her hot forehead as his brow furrowed with concern. “Are you alright?”

Minerva hoped she didn’t take too long to answer, too preoccupied with making sense of his words. She swallowed to soothe her suddenly dry throat and nodded, unable to take her eyes off of him. “…I missed you,” she breathed, taking a weak hold of his hand and bringing it to her lips to kiss his knuckles.

He laughed softly against her temple before pressing another kiss to it. He gently disentangled himself from her, smiling at the soft moan of disappointment she let out. “Can I take this off?” he asked, touching the bottom of her shirt.

She nodded and, in spite of her weakened muscles, sat up to let him tug her shirt off, letting him see the changes in her body. She kicked off her shoes and pulled her trousers and underwear the rest of the way off, tugging off her brassiere last and putting it aside. She was still mostly all hard muscle save for a residual softness and faded stretch marks along her belly and thighs from her pregnancy.

Martin gently touched a scar above her right breast, Minerva shuddering as he followed a path between her breasts and traced another one on the right side of her belly. He looked at her with a fond smile. “You never put the sword down, did you?”

She blushed and smiled back at him, leaning back on the heels of her hands to let him see the scars crossing the length of her body. She had no qualms about putting herself on display, wanting him to see everything, every tale her body had to tell of the years after his departure. “Not for a second,” she answered quietly, not wanting to disturb the slow path his eyes were taking.

* * *

Battles fought and won, all of them marking Minerva’s skin in ways he’d never thought to picture back when she was younger, and Martin tried not to think too hard about what manner of weapon may have caused them. Not when she was sitting in front of him, boldly displaying herself. 

He first touched the spot where he’d seen the first noticeable scar, next to the left corner of her mouth where a gauntleted fist had made an open wound, her weak healing leaving a scar that was among one of the first things he’d noticed when she first appeared in his life. It was faded but still there, moving and changing along with her mood. Up when she smiled. Low when she wept. Immobile beneath his lips when he held her. He’d never seen her without it, a scar that recalled the hours of pain before his father crossed her path, a precursor of wounds she’d receive from hands that hated her. She kissed his fingertips, all resentment absent from her vivid eyes.

His hand found the familiar scar on her left side and curled it warmly over her skin, stroking the marred flesh slowly. “Do you remember wanting me when I healed this?” He remembered her timid confession, remembered his own flush of emotion at the sight of her relief when he placed a healing hand on the wound she’d attempted to heal while on horseback from Lake Arrius.

She nodded, her hand reaching to touch his mouth briefly before making its way to his chest. “I still want you,” she whispered before leaning forward and kissing him, tugging at his shirt with a soft laugh against his lips.

Martin helped her remove his shirt and let her gather him in her arms, pressing the skin of their torsos together in a desperate joining that drew a ragged sigh from Minerva’s throat. His hands stroked the curves of her body as he placed loving kisses and nips to the length of her neck, his ears trained on the sounds he was finally coaxing out of her, a shudder making its way down his spine when her fingers wound into his hair and _pulled_ when he had his lips over her breast.

He felt her body shake with the blessed sound of her laughter at the soft moan that had escaped him. “I’m glad I remembered that,” she breathed, and he gave her a brief warning glance before he closed his mouth over her nipple, her amusement fading to a helpless whimper as her body arched toward him. His tongue traced the shallow lines along the bottom of her breasts, down to the hardness of her belly. He felt her legs open as he went lower, framing his sides as he kissed the pale marks that remained of her pregnancy.

Just days before he’d done the same in their shared room in Cloud Ruler Temple, never imagining she was carrying Gaius. He fought down the sliver of horror that threatened to pierce his heart at the thought of having sent Minerva into the worst dangers imaginable while she was carrying their son. She had survived, and so had the babe who had grown into a fine man by all accounts, all thanks to Minerva.

He kissed his gratitude into her skin, felt the tension in the unyielding muscle of her thighs when his hands curled around each one, keeping them parted with gentle force as Minerva’s fingers ran through his hair, her hum of anticipation hanging between them. Martin kissed the soft tuft of hair before prodding between her folds with his tongue.

Minerva shook beneath him, her hands flying away from his head to clutch at the sheets as she moaned in a mixture of agony and pleasure, the sound making Martin grow harder until he thought to loosen the ties of his trousers and free his erection. It offered some relief but he was determined to make this moment about Minerva and everything he _wanted_ to give her. He moved his tongue deep inside her, and her desperate cries are nearly enough to make Martin climax without a touch.

Her hips bucked towards his mouth and her cries came louder and quicker until she sobbed in release and he felt the taste of her flood his mouth, his grip on her thighs unyielding to keep her still as his mouth worked her through the aftershocks. He pulled away and let her unsteady legs go, his eyes taking in the sight of her trembling body as her breaths came out in long shudders, her hands covering her eyes.

Martin tried to find his voice to ask if she was fine but she eased his concern with soft, breathless laughter as she uncovered her yes, bright with intense pleasure as they looked at him and he lost his breath with the power of her gaze. “Oh gods…Oh gods, my ears are actually ringing…”

Dragonblood flowed through his veins. He’d lain in her arms so many times. He’d held control over unspeakable magic. He’d become a god and he still had to ask himself how he had ever managed to deserve Minerva Saturnius. He could only think to ask, “You didn’t hit your head, did you?”

He basked in the music of her laughter. “No!” she exclaimed before pulling him back down to her, her lips capturing his in a desperate kiss even though she was undoubtedly exhausted. He kept touching her, smoothing down her body with a light touch and brief kisses he could only hope gave silent testimony to all he felt for her. The love, admiration, empathy, all of the emotions he’d felt in the few months they’d had together. 

 _She raised our son_ , he remembered with a tremor that wracked his body as hers moved beneath him. He reached between them, his hand lingering on her belly, wanting to imagine the lovely swell of a growing child between them. That was the only true regret that would ever haunt him, his heart and eyes aching for the sight of the boy, youth, man whose bones lay in that silent crypt.

The thought was enough to slow his caresses across Minerva’s body, letting her plant sweet and hungry kisses along his face, neck, and chest. He closed his eyes and felt her hands roam over him, hissing when her hand curled over his neglected length, her coo of sympathy making his limbs suddenly weak, his mind blocking all other thoughts save for those that revolved around the woman who had him in her hands.

“Inside me, love,” she said in her soft voice, her breath warming his ear as he groaned at the thought of sinking into her.

“You’re sure?” he asked, looking down into her eyes, bright with pleasure and want. Still that same, sensual stare that was more powerful than anything he’d ever encountered.

 _“Please,”_ she begged, hands framing his face with a gentility that made his heart ache and reminded him just how fortunate he was.

* * *

Minerva exhaled shakily as Martin moved above her, her legs opening to accommodate him again. She closed her eyes, losing herself in her rapid heartbeat as his hands and lips caressed her face. She nearly sobbed with the intensity of the emotions overtaking her, his lips kissing away the little tears that leaked out of the corners of her eyes even as she smiled. He gazed down at her and laced their fingers together beside her head, giving a reassuring squeeze as he pressed the head of his erection at her entrance. 

She gasped at the intrusion, her walls suddenly squeezing uncomfortably around him and her hand nearly crushing his. “Wait— _mm_ —stop a moment,” she gasped, forcing herself to relax and breathe.

He stiffened above her, hands still stroking her face comfortingly, making her forget that she was breathing hard. “Am I hurting you?” he asked, voice strained.

Minerva shook her head, fingers combing through his dark hair reassuringly. “No. No, you’re not, I swear,” she said, wanting to beg and _take_ even when her body wanted to take it slow. She fixed her gaze on him and her hands stroked their way up his arms to his hard shoulders. “Can you lie back?”

He nodded before quickly pressing a kiss to her forehead and gently pulling away from her, moving to lie on his back so Minerva could straddle him. Her breathing stopped at the sight of him beneath her, hair spread across the pillow on what could have passed as her bed two from centuries ago.

Alive, breathing, wanting her, love in the warm blue of his eyes that reminded her of early mornings. Minerva reached down to gently grasp his weeping length to guide him inside her, and her eyes closed at the initial discomfort as she slowly lowered herself.

His hands squeezed her hips before one reached to stroke her breast. Minerva breathed steadily as she took him in deeper until he was completely inside her and she gasped. “ _Oh…_ ” Gods, it was a stretch that had her eyes closing in rapture, heat blooming in her belly as they breathed together, joined and wanting more. Minerva opened her eyes to gaze down at Martin, and trembled at the look of need in his eyes. “Oh, that’s perfect…”

She moved slowly at first, reminding herself how having him inside of her felt and remembering to let him hear how wonderful he made her feel. She was barely aware of him sitting up and crushing her against him, mouth closing over her nipple as she rode him with growing desperation, moaning his name like she’d wanted to for so many years, holding his head against her body.

He thrust up against her, Minerva letting out a sudden scream as she squeezed around him in a combination of agony and pleasure. “ _Oh, Martin!_ Yes…like that, _yes!_ Come inside me!” she begged, nails raking paths across his shoulders as she keened.

His answering moan in her ear made her fall silent as she tensed and came, only managing a soft whine as she threw her head back and let him see what he did to her. Only moments after she felt the heat of his release inside of her and the hard clutch of his arms around her as he groaned against her skin.

Shaking and slowing the roll of her hips, Minerva let out a hiccupped sob of emotional and physical exhaustion as she let Martin hold her and maneuver her body as he wanted, barely aware of him pulling out of her and drunk on pleasure and joy as his thumbs wiped the tears that fell down her cheeks. He held her for a few moments before she noticed he was moving beyond her reach, and she whimpered in soft distress, weakly flinging an arm toward him.

Martin returned to press a brief kiss against her lips, stroking her face and whispering, “I’m not leaving, I just want to get us a washcloth, love.” She closed her eyes and moments later felt him wiping her down with a wet cloth, sprinkling loving kisses on her face and hands. She sighed deeply at the long sweeps across her body, warmth spreading through her chest at how relaxed and happy she was. When he finished he lay next to her and she immediately pressed against him, humming contentedly as she kissed his collarbone and his arms wrapped around her. “Are you hurting at all?”

She shook her head no, not bothering to find her voice.

“Use your words, love.”

She smiled at the amusement in his voice. “I’m alright,” she whispered, chuckling at how _destroyed_ she sounded. Pleasant aches settled over her limbs and she rejoiced in the familiar feeling of being in his arms after making love, knowing it was real and he was the one holding her. “I missed you,” she repeated into the hollow of his collarbone, sighing when his embrace tightened.

“I love you,” he whispered, hands stroking through her hair in soothing motions as she relaxed and dried the rest of her sudden tears on his warm skin, eyeing the fading flush across his chest and glad she remembered it.

“Let's go to Skyrim," she murmured. "We can get married here, there, anywhere. I don't think we can stay here too long."

She looked up and saw him nod, knowing he agreed with her misgivings even if she didn't have to voice them. In the quiet she could hear the familiar sounds of distress in the streets, no doubt about the absence of the dragon statue in the Temple District. They could not stay in her home without arousing suspicion, especially not knowing what issues it would present to Nivea and the crown. 

In a way it would be a comfort to return to Skyrim, where she and Guy spent so many years together, watching him grow stronger, fall in love, and marry. She could share all of that with Martin and live a life with him, a new one where she could live as openly as possible with him as his wife, keeping their pasts secret.

Even having those choices was a gift Minerva would always be grateful for. While Guy's absence would always hurt, he had lived as full a life as possible, with all its joys and sorrows.

Minerva would do no less.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my tumblr: **aeriamamaduck**


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